Do you guys like homesteading projects? And textile arts? And not spending money? And hoarding avocados? Then you’ll love this little experiment I did with a handful of old shirts and a basketful of avocados!
Exhibit A: This top used to be white.
Truth be told, I’ve never been one of those crazy people obsessed with all things avocado-related. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a delicious topping on tacos or toast or whatever and I’ll even admit I love a good guacamole. But in it’s pure unadulterated form? Meh.
But when I started reading up on natural dyes and found out that there are a whole host of fruits and vegetables you can use to dye fabric with (onion skins, blueberries, beets, the list goes on…) I really wanted to give the mighty avocado a second chance. Instead of tossing my avocado pits and skins in the compost/trash every taco Tuesday (too many avocado pits and skins can slow down the progress of your compost pile), I began considering how I could maximize their usage.
I am by no means an expert at natural dyes, but I did learn a few things. If you try dying with avocado pits, here are some tips I learned along the way…
Soymilk plays a surprising role in preparing your fabric for the avocado dye
Fabric Matters
Natural dyes work best with natural fabrics. You’ll get much better results with cotton, linen, silk, and wool, and in fact synthetic fabrics like polyester just won’t absorb the dye at all. When you think of the fact that polyester fibers are really just plastic, it makes sense to me that it wouldn’t work — the fibers have no way of absorbing the compounds and the dye will slip right off.
Preparing the Fabric
Fabric should be thoroughly cleaned beforehand (a process called “scouring”). A good run through the washer and dryer with detergent should do it to remove oils and debris. After my fabric was washed and dried, I also prepared my fabric with a mordant. I’ll be honest, some of the information I read about mordanting fabrics was a bit over my head (I knew I should have paid closer attention in high school chemistry), but as far as I understand it, fibers will absorb dye differently depending on whether they are cellulose-based (like cotton and linen) or protein-based (like silk and wool). Protein fibers generally absorb the dye much better, so if you’re using cellulose fibers, mordanting can help mimic the proteins found in protein fibers (still following?) I chose to dye three shirts — one was 100% linen and the other two were 100% cotton. The most commonly used mordant for dying is alum powder (alum sulfate), which is a metallic salt, but I really wanted to use materials which were readily available, already in my cupboard, and plant-based. Turns out soy milk is a great binder for this purpose. I soaked my shirts in a large bath of soy milk and water (with a 1:5 ratio) for two days in my garage, making sure that there was enough liquid in the bath to fully saturate all the shirts and allow them to move around a bit (I stirred them a few times because I was paranoid about them not soaking up the soybean goodness uniformly… or maybe I was just bored and looking for something to fuss over). By the way, it should be noted that leaving soy milk to sit out, unrefrigerated WILL result in a smell. It’s not… terrible? But you might want to find a place where it can hang out, without making everyone queasy.
Be Patient
Keep in mind that this whole thing is by no means a quick process. I tend to be generally impatient and guilty of giving in to things which provide instant gratification so this was HARD for me. But it was also really rewarding, gave me something to look forward to every day, and was just really cool to see the magic of plants at work. Just to give you an idea of the timetable, here’s how long each step took me…
Timetable/Steps
Collecting/hoarding and consuming avocados: 2 weeks (my boyfriend and I managed to eat a total of 13 avocados over the course of two weeks and once they were cleaned of all their green “meat” they were washed, thoroughly dried, and stored in the freezer until I was ready to make the dye bath. Keep in mind you can continue to collect avocado pits/skins while you mordant and cure your fabric
Washing/drying fabric: 1 day (I chose to line-dry only because one of my shirts was somewhat delicate)
Mordanting with soy milk: 2 days
Curing the mordant: 5 days (everything I read said to let the mordant cure for a week but I really wanted to make my dye bath on the weekend and the timing just worked out that way)
Making the dye bath: 1-2 days (I let the avocado pits/skin do their thing over low heat for 4 or 5 hours, then turned off the heat and let them continue to sit for another 30 hours or so
Dying the fabric: 1-2 days (after straining all the pits and skins out of the dye pot, I turned the heat back on to let the dye bath simmer, added my fabric, stirred it around and let it continue to simmer for 3 or 4 hours, then turned the heat off and let it sit for another 24 hours)
All the pits and skins, strained from the dye pot after two days
Be Open to the Unexpected
There are so many factors which can affect your results with natural dyes. How ripe were your avocados? How many avocados did you use? What kind of water did you use (filtered? tap water? distilled? rainwater?) Did you use a mordant? How long did the mordanted fabric cure? All of these decisions can produce totally different results, so it’s a good idea to have a sense of adventure about the outcome.
I’m currently in the process of collecting acorns for my next dye experiment. If I manage to have a go at it, maybe I’ll do a better job of documenting that process start-to-finish. I could kick myself now for not getting a decent photo of my white shirt pre-avocado dye, but since it’s become my go-to for Renaissance Festival garb, this goofy shot will have to do…
See? White… and nerdy.
And now pink! (still nerdy)
Planning to try your hand at avocado dye? Let me know if you do, I’d love to see what you create!